


I tried

by Carbon65



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Anxiety, Depression, Drabble, Miscarriage, Pre-Movie(s), Stillbirth, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-04
Updated: 2014-05-04
Packaged: 2018-01-21 23:26:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1567832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Carbon65/pseuds/Carbon65
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I tried too. But, I didn’t have the other guy to protect me.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I tried

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by this [gif set](http://radioactivepigeons.tumblr.com/post/84701394986). (Not mine, gif set was not linked to the original poster)
> 
> Please note that this deals _very_ explicitly with suicide. It's written in the moment that a choice has to be made. It may be triggering to some people.

_“In case you needed to kill me. But you can’t. I tried.”_

...

I look at the reflection of the boy in the black tie. Messy black hair. Red-rimmed eyes. It is the only way red hasn’t looked good on me.

I stare at the note my father left. The one with the last will and testament making me the heir to a fortune I don’t want and can’t manage.

It would be so easy to leave the responsibility to someone else. It would be so much easier to let someone manage who wasn’t fourteen.

I stare at the words, at the pocket watch in my hand and the tie around my neck.

 _To Tony, my beloved son.  
_ It is a word. _Beloved_.  
It is a promise. _Beloved_.  
It is a lie. _Beloved_.

He didn’t love me. He didn’t understand me. He wanted a legacy. An engineer. A prodigy.

He wanted Steve Rogers. He got Tony Stark instead.

He was a son of a bitch. He was my father. He could bring about my destruction.

I take the tie off my neck, and unknot it.

I tied a new knot in the tie.

I smashed my fist into the bathroom mirror.

Red dripped across the white tile of the bathroom.  
Red dripped across the white carpet of the bedroom.  
Red dripped across the white carpet of the closet.

I stare at the black tie looped over the bar.  
I take it down, loop it around my neck.

I get a chair.  
Just tighten and jump.  
Easy as an integral.

Except that I am afraid to die.

Because what if the thing that comes after is worse.

It’s better to be the fucked up but beloved than the dead beloved son who pleases your father.

...

I look at the pills my mother no longer needs. The orange bottles sit in a neat row, the pills distorted and jewel like.  
 _Maria Stark. Take one tablet once a day.  
_ _Maria Stark. Take one tablet before bed.  
_ _Maria Stark. Take one tablet when anxious. Repeat every eight hours. Not to exceed four tablets in a twenty-four hour period._  
The instructions were so simple, but she couldn’t stick to them.

I can be like my mother. I can finish what she never could. Maybe if I do it, she will love me more than she loved the drugs.

It started when I was born. Obediah and Howard - my father - told me so.  
It was my fault.

Before I was born, my mother was happy. She was a socialite, a member of the nouveau-rich. She was an all American Princess. She had no reason to be sad.  
And then I was born.

I was not supposed to be born alone. I was supposed to have a brother, another half.

He was pulled free first, whole and tiny and blue. He had ten perfect fingers and ten perfect toes and lungs that never formed correctly. Baby Howard.  
I can next, pink fingers curling around his heel. I had ten fingers and ten toes and a howl like a banshee.  
It was my voice that heralded the collection of the slain.

After that, my mother never could be happy. She never could smile. She never could be proud of me.  
Because I was Cain, the child who had killed my brother.

It would be so easy to shake out the handful of pills.  
It would be so easy to wash them down with my best friends, Johnny, Jack and Jim.  
It would be so easy to slip into oblivion.

But my mother cannot be proud of me anymore.  
So I have to make someone else proud.

And I cannot do that if I am gone.

It’s better to make someone proud by carrying on than to be nothing and a disappointment.

…

I look at the knife Obadiah gave me for graduation. The blade is long and sharp. The handle is mother of pearl.

For the sharpest boy I know. Congratulations, MIT class of ’88.

It sits next to my class ring, a reminder of all I have accomplished.

Like never once making it to a freshman seminar and managing to pass anyway.  
Like almost blowing up the chemistry lab with potassium after being away seventy-two hours straight.  
Like the five girls, and seventeen boys I paid off to never speak about the sex we had.

College was supposed to be a time of self discovery. I discovered many things about myself.  
That when I get anxious my breath catches in my chest and stays there until I’m ready to tear open my chest to start it moving again.  
That letting people use you for money or brains or your name or sex feels just as shitty at the end as it did in the beginning.  
That sometimes you have to turn off your brain otherwise it will make you crazy.

I cannot turn off my brain. I cannot stop the constant stream of thoughts, ideas, plans, worries, omissions, failures…

The knife is sharp.  
Sharp enough to make those thoughts go away.  
Sharp enough to drag me into oblivion.  
Sharp enough to leave just a memory.

But, the thoughts remind me, there is too much to do.  
The thoughts remind me that I am still a failure.  
The thoughts remind me that I will remain a failure until I succeed.

I do not want to be remembered as a failure. That would be the deepest slice of all.

…

I tried too. But, I had to protect myself.


End file.
